Oneida Indian Chiefs and Leaders

An Oneida chief who signed the treaty of 1788. He was a well educated man and had visited Lafayette in France, but returned to savage life. He was a member of the delegation of chiefs to Philadelphia in 1792, where he died and was buried with military honors. He is also called Peter Otzagert and Peter Jaquette. Elkanah Watson described him at the treaty of 1788. Peter Otsiequette, perhaps the same Indian, witnessed the Onondaga treaty of 1790. (w. 51. B.)

Oneyana

Alias Beech Tree. An Oneida Chief at the treaty of 1788, and called Peter Oneyana at the treaty of 1785. In 1792 Beech Tree was the principal chief and quite influential, witnessing the Cayuga treats’ of 1789 and the Onondaga treaty of 1790, and signing the letters of 1786 and 1787. As Onyanta, or Beech Tree, he signed Col. Harper’s deed. He probably died before 1795.

Scarouady

Scarouady (Skaron’ hiă’dǐ`, ‘on the other side of the sky.’Hewitt).. An Oneida chief, sometimes called Half-King, who came into prominence about the middle of the 18th century. He was known among the Delawares as Monacatuatha, or Monakaduto. He is mentioned as early as 1748, and in 1753 was present at the Carlisle treaty. The following year he succeeded Half-King Scruniyatha in the direction of affairs at Aughwick, Pennsylvania. 1Pa. Archiv., 1st s., II, 114, 1853 , whither he removed from Logstown to escape the influence of the French. On Jan. 7, 1754, he was in Philadelphia, on his way to the Six Nations with a message from the Governor of Virginia, and also by the desire of the Indians of Pennsylvania to ask the former to send deputies to a conference with the Governor. He was with Braddock at the time of his defeat, having made in the preceding May a speech to the Indians at Ft Cumberland urging them to join Braddock in his expedition. In 1756 he seems to have been attending conferences and making speeches, mostly in behalf of peaceful measures, in some of these efforts being joined by Andrew Montour. One of his speeches was made July 1, 1756, at the conference of the Six Nations with Sir William Johnson in behalf of the Shawnee and Delawares 2N. Y. Doc. Col. Hist., vii, 148, 1856 . Mention is made in the same year of his son who had been taken prisoner by the French and afterward released, and who soon thereafter visited and conferred with Johnson. Scarouady was a firm friend of the English colonists, and as strong an enemy of the French. He was an orator of considerable ability, and was the leading speaker at the numerous conferences he attended. His home was on the Ohio River in west Pennsylvania, where he exercised jurisdiction over the western tribes similar to that of Shikellimay over those in central Pennsylvania.